“Long after I am gone, when the desert sands have buried the broken towns, the blistered ancient holy buildings, the decayed bodies of ages, and all is dust once more, and rivers have diluted every drop of our blood and washed it to oblivion, and the memory of this history is a forgotten series of ones and noughts, and the seeming swell of new terrors have long since been targeted and again waylaid, or denied, and hypocrisies have risen and been suppressed, and lies like tombstones have founded the cities of the future; then will you see I was right.”
100-Word Fiction: ‘Leafspotting’
The warden picked up a leaf. It was perfectly orange but it wasn’t the right one. He looked around, across the park to the woods. The landscape was shades of amber and red. He picked up another leaf. No, perhaps not that one either. He walked down the path and picked up another. Not bad, but still not right. What would the right leaf look like? He should check them all, suspiciously, just in case. He didn’t know why he was looking, only that he’d been told to. He followed orders. And these leaves! They were everywhere this sad autumn.
100-Word Fiction: ‘New Dress’
Eschewing the flamboyant (critics said “grotesque and overindulgent”) designs of the previous decade, the new couturier at the fashion house picked up his scissors and set to work. He had chosen a heavy material and was mulling over words: sackcloth? Too pious. Workwear? Blandly utilitarian. He sighed and snipped – and snipped until a small, minimalist dress was made. In at the waist (tight at the belt) and accentuating the bust, he thought. But not one of his models would wear it. All they saw was snippets of cloth lying across the floor – and the dress, a tiny, useless remnant of fabric.
100-Word Fiction: ‘A Family’
Did I even wear spectacles when I began all this? My hair was thicker, definitely: brown, remember? Now it is thinned and grey. It needs to be cropped short. I was slim then too, though I didn’t think so at the time. Out of shape is what I said. I looked at myself; looked at the kids coming through. Their wee bandy legs and enthusiasm. They’ve done well. Better than I could’ve hoped. But they grow up and leave, filled with urgency, pride and belief in themselves. And I remain. Some say I could have stopped them. But that’s family.
100-Word Fiction: ‘A Sense of Light’
I woke from a sleep that was dominated by nightmares; or, at least, I began to wake. I think I did. The images of a sleep’s horror were still a storm in my mind, dark thoughts dissolved in the tears that drenched my closed eyes.
There, waiting, eyes closed, almost too painful to look. Almost to think – almost – that it would be better for the terror to continue than to hope it is near its end and then open your eyes to find it continues and you have failed to shake it off.
But I can sense light, I can.
100-Word Fiction: ‘Vipera Berus’
There is a way to construct a speech – to put words together, to make people smile or clap or think you’ve said something new or important. You get taught it at management seminars. You just use the same words everyone uses. Swap them around a bit. Don’t worry. Look confident. Don’t take risks. It’s smoke and mirrors. The truth is a fuzzy outline, bent out of shape. Left becomes right.
Geoff Oborne laughed as he switched channels from the news to a nature programme on the courting rituals of Vipera berus, the common European viper. Now there was a creature!
100-Word Fiction: ‘Your Arms Around Me’
To have your arms around me again. Your arm around my shoulders, resting there a moment. So many things come to mind. The times we have embraced and all of the reasons. Yes, love. Of course, love. We do love. That arm of support. The arm that draws me near, into your reach, to your steady, solid body. Your arm over me, so you can guide me, move me, show me the way. Your arm pulling me in your direction. The arm that means ‘well done’. The arm with which you say ‘Brother, I will always be older than you’.
100-Word Fiction: ‘The Mountain Tigers’
They have been trailing us for years. We know that. In fact there is little we do not know about their activities because we see everything. They are clumsy. Sometimes when we watch them we pity them in their struggle for understanding. Their cameras and computers are a heavy load in rough terrain, while we are assured as we rise from the jungle to the colder plains at the foot of the mountains. They do not mean harm. You can see it in their eyes. But more will come after them. More and more. And that is what we fear.
100-Word Fiction: ‘How Long I Walked’
Today, as they talked, I again took notes. The records will show I wrote:
‘[I] believe that if the P___ leadership adheres to continuous negotiations, despite the obstacles that are coming up on every side, and if it is serious and determined in its intention to advance towards peace, just as we are serious, then it will be possible to, within a year, reach a framework that will be the basis for a peace settlement.”
Later I walked out along the cliffs. The sky was blue and I enjoyed the breeze. But a deep sadness is on the horizon. Again.
100-Word Fiction: ‘I.O.U.’
Aw c’mon, said Joe. Ye’ve got to be kidding me, it was years ago. We had a deal. Ye never said anything at the time.
Yeah but Joe that’s just it: I never did say anything. You’ve just assumed something. I never promised anything.
Joe shook his head:
But Ian, ye just, I mean I just… it was all accepted.
But it wasn’t Joe. I accepted nothing. You owe me: I want it back.
Joe turned away. It had been a done deal. He couldn’t even remember how much it was. And now when times were bad, times were bad…
MW Bewick 